Warfare (2025): Review
Stub • 391 Words • Film, 2025 • 12/01/2025 • View in graph
⚠️ This post contains a rougher cut of my thoughts on the topic and may be updated in the future. Please forgive any mistakes or lack of polish!
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A platoon of American Navy SEALs on a surveillance mission gone wrong in insurgent territory. A boots-on-the-ground story of modern warfare and brotherhood, told in real time and based on the memory of the people who lived it.
There are 439 words in this article, and it will probably take you less than 3 minutes to read it.
This article was published 2025-12-01 00:00:00 -0500, which makes this post and me old when I published it.
with this movie being focused on a realistic portrayal of just one military engagement the focus is not on the general war and interrogations on the justness of it
- civilian involvement is given a bit of thought while not the main focus
- showing how it affects locals and destroy lives and property even if they aren’t acting as soldiers in the war
i think that the honest portrayal of war will resonate differently with everyone depending on their preconceptions
- to me, it is gruesome and traumatic and messy portrayal but in a way that reads to me like it is not trying to glorify or fetishize it
- a bit one note of “war is hell” but it is better than other lenses I suppose
- i don’t think they are necessarily painted as heroes
- since the subjects are living/real people a base level of respect is given to them in their own story
- but they aren’t painted as courageous heroes in my opinion
- they make the local soldiers go out first to open the tank doors and then send the first Seal out after the locals come back safely
- they make mistakes and are traumatized by the actions that play out
masculinity as a theme:
- brotherhood a bit but not as much as it was marketed as
- being called weak when the guy filling in as sniper didn’t take the shot
- opening scene is all the guys watching a racy exercise video together
- the soldier from the other unit not really taking the casualties seriously and trying to give a severely out of touch pep talk to the wounded
it was well produced with good cinematography and sound design and while not super artistic still had some good artistic choices
- i liked how audio and talking would overlap sometimes
- i enjoyed when in some scenes there was no sound at all
with all that being said why this movie and why now?
- i think it is strange on garland and a24’s part to make and distribute this movie
- maybe as a cautionary tale for war but it doesn’t seem as important as other stories in this moment